Membership Expired Matt Pocock
Membership ExpiredForum Replies Created
-
Haha I bet – Dover’s a tough strip! – how does a Skype this weekend look?
-
Check for tension in his abdominal muscles (especially rectus abdominis) – I’m guessing that he’ll be using those muscles to compensate for his balance in lieu of his legs. But no reason why you should lower your expectations – he sounds like a great client to have! Also, you can use his wheelchair to help him anchor:) Great to hear that you’re getting cracking with the teaching, Ben 🙂
-
Worst for me was getting laryngitis, and having a new student come round who I’d forgotten I’d booked in – answering the door unwashed in a dressing gown, explaining in a hoarse, tiny whisper “Yes, I’m a singing teacher.” She didn’t come back. #excellentmarketing
-
Eliza, your set-up is the same as mine – except I have 24 hours. Your 48 hours seems very fair for you since you have to rent a studio room. Sounds like you’ve got it fixed up nicely – and the student will feel like they’ve got their money back if you miss their lesson. If I botch a lesson timing (I’ve double-booked students before!) then I give them a half-price lesson, but if you just can’t make it then there’s no reason to feel like you should give them something in return! Sounds like you’re all over it
-
Oooh – that’s cool
-
You bet – I’ve even got one for tracking enquiries that you would absolutely love. You just ‘star’ an email and it prints their email address and name to a spreadsheet.
-
Totally – for the brief period that I had an under-teacher, I set up different accounts on IFTTT for each teacher. So when they added sessions to their calendar, it came up on the same spreadsheet, but recorded who had taught the lesson.
-
You got it!
-
That shoutiness you’re feeling is called the Lombard Effect – a natural lift in volume that we get from being in loud environments. It’s very hard to control and rein in.
It sounds like you’re getting some light wear and tear on your vocal folds from being in those loud rooms. It certainly happened to me when I was in a band in uni. In your late twenties, your voice should be at its peak, instead of declining. Vocal decline happens when the cartilage begins to ossify, and that’s not until your late fifties (though this varies a lot, depending on use).
I’d recommend seeing if you can fight against the urge to get louder by singing in a very small, compact way in rehearsals. Though it’s great fun to give it your all, your voice won’t thank you for it, and you’re more likely to develop a sustainable technique by practicing in a quiet environment.
-
Hey Frank,
Sounds like you made a great move – blaming it on external factors takes the pressure off yours and the student’s relationship. I had to increase my prices from £25/hour to £35/hour after taking on a Masters and moving to Guildford. I think when you’ve built up a lot of goodwill with students over the course of your lessons, the students become your advocates. If you spin it the right way, they can actually be supportive of the change!
But sounds like you did all the right things:)
Matt:)
-
Ok – that sounds like quite a lot of vocal loading: usually the part above the flip is the first to feel the strain. I’d recommend seeing a singing teacher if you can to straighten out any areas of technique. It’s always great to have a second pair of eyes on you.
-
How about the last question of mine? That’ll tell us a lot.
-
Hey Lydia – sounds like something that you definitely want to get checked out. A couple of questions:
Does it feel heavy and effortful when you sing (normally) on higher ranges?
When you say ‘high notes’, do you mean the high notes of chest voice or the area when it flips over?
Do you find making vocal fry(/creak) difficult?
-
Hey Rosie,
Some students just need to speak to you beforehand to check if you’re human! It can be weird going to a new place for some people so maybe it’s just that they need some confirmation that you’re real. I’m sure it’s less about information, more about trust and warmth. I always try and speak to my students once before their first lesson, even though I feel icky on the phone too. So give them a call and see if that resolves anything.
Matt:)
-
Absolutely:) If you feel comfortable, your student will feel comfortable – but the reverse is also true!
-
Send her to a voice therapist/SLT/ENT straight away! I’d also recommend not taking her on as a student. She should probably be on vocal rest and doing SLT exercises to mitigate the blisters on her folds, not engaging in vigorous voice work!
-
Eep – no idea! I’d try to find a SLT in your area who you can ask!
-
(You’re a Lessac fan, Chris? Wooooo! Love him!)
-
That’s so interesting! It’s bizarre that there’s such a gap in terminology between us and that we call the same bit of teaching different things! Would love to organise a Skype so we can record our thoughts – this would make such a good podcast!
-
Wes – that’s a really good point and one that comes up for me a lot. I’ve got quite a loose view on the cancellation policies – I’ll often let students off if they’re ill, especially if they kick up a fuss. You’ve got to take the long view – is charging this student now going to cost me in the future?
Because, yes, they’re nominally wasting your time (though you can usually spend it productively, hacking away at the admin mountain) but the real goal is about maximising the student’s value. You don’t want to alienate a student who might come for 10, 15, or even 20 more lessons – which is an astounding amount of time (and money) that they’re investing in you.
So I don’t know – maybe looseness is better?
EDIT: Having quickly scanned the forum above – I’ve noticed that this opinion is quite rare among us! Maybe I’m too soft-hearted. Must watch more Game Of Thrones.
-
I definitely need to diversify my portfolio of ‘I understood something’ idioms.
The vocal fry sound is made by the vocal folds, but they can change it by adjusting the shape of their mouth. So it’s basically a way of showing the student that the filter matters too in the tuning of the note. Does that make sense, or am I talking gibberish?
Here’s a little recording:
http://mattpocock.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/ZOOM0075.mp3
-
Oh man, I had such a huge breakthrough with this a few months ago. It went like this:
For so long, I thought that tuning was a mental process. If the student understood the concept that one note was higher than another, or that they were going flat or sharp, they would automatically know how to improve. It seemed like some students just didn’t know the differences between sharp and flat or high and low. So if I just told them again and again, they’d eventually understand.
Needless to say, this approach got me nowhere except that theme park called Frustration Land – of which I became a season ticket holder.
But finally it hit me. Students learn how to sing from how they speak. And non-singers tend to speak in quite a narrow register.
They don’t know how it feels to sing higher or lower. They only know the feeling of their own speaking register. But what is involved in the feeling of a high note? Obviously, the vocal folds vibrate faster, but there was surely a lot more than that:
I started breaking it down. First of all, the larynx needs to rise a little. The pharynx gains a little bit of helpful tension. Everything narrows a bit more. The tongue rises. The lips, if you’d like, can get more widened. The placement of the note (whatever that means) feels a little higher – more towards the forehead than the throat.
And then finally, WHAM. It hit me.
To teach a student tuning, you can’t just explain it in concepts. You had to acquaint them with the physical symptoms of high and low notes. And the physical symptoms the student feels are all about the filter – the mouth, the larynx height, the tongue, the lips, pharyngeal tension, and the ‘placement’.
So I call this ‘filter tuning’.
Let’s take an example. A male student is trying to tune to a middle C. This can be a fairly high note for some students just starting out. They keep undershooting it by some distance.
What you should notice is that the mouth is almost completely disengaged. There’s no sense of them raising the larynx/tongue/lips or anything. The mouth is just where it is when they speak.
So what they need to do, in this new terminology, is ‘tune the filter up‘.
The way I do this is simple:
1. Make a vocal fry sound.
2. Now make the lowest vocal fry sound you can.
3. Now make the highest vocal fry sound you can, without actually making a note.
You’ll notice that on step two, the filter tunes downwards, dropping the larynx, lowering the tongue and jaw.
On step three, the filter tunes upwards, lifting the larynx, heightening the tongue, widening the lips.
But here’s the kicker – this is all being changed by the filter. Nothing about the actual vocal folds is changing here – the sound difference is all in the way the mouth and vocal tract are changing shape.
(If the student struggles with vocal fry, this can also be done on breath. You’re then listening for the ‘dark quality’ or ‘light quality’ of the breath)
So returning to that student. Ask him to tune his filter up using vocal fry, and then to sing the note. If he still undershoots, tune it up a little more. You’ll be amazed at the difference.
-
@Eliza Woohoo! Guess my SEO must be working!
Let’s demystify the recoil breath. It helps to remember that the diaphragm only works ONE WAY. And that way is DOWN. Just like a bicep can only pull in one direction, the diaphragm can only flatten. This means that ‘singing from your diaphragm’ isn’t quite true, because the diaphragm isn’t active during singing.
@Monika – Great to have you here! The lungs do have some natural elasticity to them, but they don’t pull the air in when they rebound: just like a balloon doesn’t pull the air in after you deflate it. But 3 perfect exercises nonetheless.
The recoil breath comes down to one idea: wherever you place your attention, there will be tension. We’ve all seen this: students who, when you say ‘breathe’, inhale like a hoover doing screamo. Tons of visible neck tension, tons of audible ‘turbulence’ on the breath (which indicates laryngeal and FVF tension). Bad breathing.
This means that focusing on the in-breath is actually counter-productive. So recoil breathing focuses on the out-breath. In other words, you breathe out so your lungs completely deflate (on a ‘ff’ sound or any fricative), then allow the breath in. I replied to a post on reddit with a really helpful gif to describe it.
This actually comes from a practice called ‘Accent Method’ which Janice Chapman loves (but for which most of the books are out of print!), but ‘recoil breath’ was coined (I think!) by Jo Estill.
-
Agreed – I had some mixed reactions: not the Love-in I was expecting!
-
3 Classics:
Singing and the Actor – Gillyanne Kayes
Singing & Teaching Singing – Janice Chapman
The Dynamics Of The Singing Voice – Meribeth Bunch Dayme3 Out-There Choices:
The Use And Training Of The Human Voice – Arthur Lessac
The Structure Of Singing – Richard Miller
Freeing The Natural Voice – Kristin LinklaterHappy holidays!
-
I’m not sure what song would be good to give her but you could try something with descending patterns like old Taylor Swift’s Shake it Off. Or do something that generally hangs out higher like Decode by Paramore? Maybe also ask her questions about what kind of music she likes – it could reveal a lot about the particular vocal sound she’s going for, or you could use it to unlock some of that tension by getting her to sing something that she says makes her feel relaxed and happy?
Another thing you can try is talking about getting a better idea of what is “good” and “bad”. She may feel that singing in a certain way (naturally) will make her sound “bad”. You can talk to her about setting more specific goals and start unlocking any beliefs about her voice that are holding her back. Remember, singing is super psychological! Never underestimate the power of a discussion and some self-acceptance/equanimity on the part of the student. <3
-
Hey Eliza,
Let me just say that it sounds like you’re doing some great work with her! Her head voice is sounding nice and sweet and there’s some really good stuff going on.
But what I can hear is a lot of tension in a few places. First of all, the nasal sound we’re hearing is caused by tension in the pharynx, soft palate and tongue root. That shortens the amount of available space in the back of the throat and causes that harsh, piercing sound. Tension in the tensor palatini and palatoglossus muscle can also prevent the soft palate from rising, causing a nasal sound.
All this could come from two places. The first, as Kat says, is over-singing – trying to ‘micromanage’ the sound into something nice can cause tension in all sorts of areas. I have a great cure for this – get her to sing as though she’s pissed off, using a ‘blah-blah-blah’ or ‘yeah-yeah-yeah’ as a reminder. If you aim it in the right way, she will feel a releasing feeling in the tongue and jaw. I also use the ‘me-nah-me-nah’ to get this release, as in here: http://mattpocock.com/2015/10/30/finding-helens-chest-voice-episode-2/.
From there, you can build the singer on top of that, getting her to make things nice while still feeling the physical release she gets when she’s pissed off. I call that relaxation ‘base camp’, then all the nice sounds are little ways up the mountain.
The second thing could be muscle tension dysphonia. That’s when there is laryngeal tension in her natural speaking voice which prevents her making a good tone. This is worth a google, since it might tell you if it’s worth sending her to a Speech & Language Therapist. But as a halfway house, I use this exercise to release laryngeal tension: http://mattpocock.com/2015/10/29/inside-matts-studio-the-ultimate-vocal-warm-down/
Hope that helps! But it sounds like you’re on the right track with her already, just making her aware of when she’s tensing is the next big step!
-
Great news!:)
-
Maybe use some political speech extracts to give them something to work on? The Gettysburg address for blokes and Emma Watson’s UN speech for ladies are both great.
-
Agreed, both wonderful ideas for keeping on students. On a more fundamental level – never being afraid to send another email to a student who you had a great lesson with, but never came back for a follow-up. So often they’ll have just forgotten, or will assume you’re busy, or will be reticent taking the first move. So send that email!
-
Apologies, maybe I wasn’t clear – I meant exercises to work the soft palate to prevent nasality in open vowels:) So if a student is using too much nasality, you can use these exercises to make a clean sound. Does that make sense?
-
Sweet, I’m guessing what the student means is that they’re closing the ‘passage’ to the nose, meaning that no sound is coming out of the nasal passage when they say open vowels.
This is a good thing. Only three sounds in the English language should be nasal: ‘m’, ‘n’ and ‘ng’. On every other sound, the nasal passage should be closed. You can test this by holding the nose while singing vowels to see if it buzzes with resonance. If it buzzes, it’s nasal.
But how does it close? It closes with the soft palate, in the back of the mouth above the tongue, which stretches up and seals the passage to the nose. This operates independently of the tongue (not counting the palato-glossus muscle). So if you look up soft palate nasality exercises you’ll find some solutions. Or does anyone else have any?
-
Awesome – that’s really interesting that you maintain that the student feels ‘gear shifts’ but still maintains a ‘mixed’ sound. I totally believe that M1 can sound exactly like M2 and vice versa when certain adaptions are made to the mouth/throat position. This means that the student feels a firm gear shift at the ‘break’, but the sound is totally smooth.
Kenneth Bozeman writes very lucidly on this, talking about the difference between ‘hoot’ tone (closed lips, head voicy-sounding) and ‘yell’ tone (spread lips, belty-sounding) and writes that both can be used in M1 and M2.
We’ll have to collaborate on an article on this on the wiki!
-
Hi Kat,
What a wonderful article to pull up! It certainly does seem that in that instance there is a co-ordination of slow release of the vocalis muscle. Although I have also seen the Thyroarytenoid muscle and the Vocalis muscle labelled as different muscles – each capable of independent movement – in other studies. This might complicate their conclusion!
I can’t claim to be an expert, but Kayes’ and Fisher’s model resonated with me as I have always felt in my own body that there is no gradient between M1 and M2. This is easy to blame on lack of register co-ordination, but I had also never observed a gradient in any of my students or colleagues – some of them seasoned pro’s.
One exceptional student (whose video I will post here but please don’t share widely) bamboozled me when I saw him. When he came to me, he completely lacked any ‘head voice’. But after a year of tuition, he sounded like this. The video is raw, and he wasn’t perfect yet (note the head position and terrible posture!) but the M1 and M2 sometimes sound identical, suggesting a ‘mix voice’.
However, listening now, I can clearly differentiate when he’s in M1 and M2 – but there are certain resonance tricks he’s using to make his M1 sound ‘heady or falsetto-like’. Have a listen, what do you think?
http://mattpocock.com/…/2015/10/Mix-Voice-Guy-Short.mov
-
I work from home! Wearing slippers to work can’t be beat! Have rented studios in the past but it always works out cheaper to see them at your place.
-
Thanks, Kat!:)
-
And, as always, how’s business?:)
-
Yep, and while one of them sings, get the other one to watch out for certain techniques (breathing, neck tension etc.). Keeps the other one involved and means they get used to correcting each other away from your lessons.
-
All about the Google Spreadsheets.
-
Most def – it’s not a method or a quick-fix, more like a scientific description of what’s actually going on. It’s the basis of what I’ve taught ever since I took one. And they’re comparatively cheap! Do it!
-
Nice! Though I would definitely recommend finesse over force when it comes to belting.
-
(For those unanointed by the holy water of Estill, the thyroid tilt can be engaged by cry-y, whiny, sobby qualities. Check out Gillyanne Kayes’ book Voice and the Actor for a great explanation.)
-
Oooh, one of my favourite topics. Chris is definitely right in recommending that there be no grit/distortion/breathiness in a belted sound. The twang is a crucial component, although I wouldn’t recommend nasality for belting. It gets the student to over-associate belting with nasality, which will lead to confusion in the long run.
I’m a big fan of using a good deal of thyroid tilt in a belt to make it safer. It thins the folds, demanding less power while also increasing note accuracy. It’s a kind of magically easy way of making notes easier – a proper Yoda move.
And it can still sound crazy awesome.
-
Don’t use the metal end.
-
Hey guys, often the male falsetto failing to come out is simple lack of muscular practice. The cricothyroid muscle is just not strong/well-co-ordinated enough to take the strain of phonation, so what comes is a weak/breathy sound. Tell them that only brute amount of practice will solve it. I had a student who I saw for a year or so that started with zero falsetto, but by the end was singing Jeff Buckley songs!
-
Agree with Chris, those prices look great and it does get really taxing teaching more than 3. I often get one student to sing, and then the others can watch them for certain techniques, such as watching the belly for breathing or listening for breathiness.
(Glad to have you in the gang, Lily! I’m a singing & voice teacher in Guildford, moving to London in September! Hope the garden city of Leeds is working out for you!)
-
Yep, most def. I actually found the shorter lessons sharpened my teaching a lot more, making me stick to one thing and make sure it’s done.
My contact were two people at Exe-Coll, Roz Harding (though she might have left!) and Katie Wild, the head of department. Go on an Estill course if you can and just wave the certificate at them, that’s how I got the job there!:)
-
(A bit of Exeter interest: where’s the school?)
-
I did some for Exeter College – they’re great fun. The 20 min lessons are generally fine if you pare down your goals and be snappy with your explanations. But make sure you know where the closest water fountain, toilet and staff room is, and who to hand your forms to. Took me about 6 months to realise I didn’t have to walk into the pub next door to take a piss.
-
Chris nailed it:)
-
Ideally both – the yawn for the relaxation and the twang for the phonation! And very low-effort twang: a mosquito sound at most.
-
Hey guys, it’s the rasp that’s causing the hurt! Any quality, be it breathiness or rasp, that a student can’t turn off spells trouble, especially one like that. I always say to students that ‘We love the rasp, but we don’t want it on by default because it narrows our options.’ It’s caused, as Chris said, by the over pushing of air through the glottis, causing the vocal folds to whack together with too much force, causing oedema and inflammation. I’d advise using light ‘twang’ exercises to get him phonating without any breathiness, then make that healthy sound the default.
-
Fun fact from Christina Shewell’s book: Voice Work. “Söderstern (1994) found that 82% of the young women whom she examined, and 61% of the older women, had this posterior glottal chink.” (171)6
-
IVA does look great, actually – we should organise a group field trip to an event:)
-
I heard about this posterior glottal chink at a conference a few weeks ago. It basically means that part of the glottis is held open while singing/speaking so that the sound carries an aspirate quality with it. Think Ray Lamontagne, Norah Jones.
How old is she? I have heard that this glottal chink can be a common occurence in adolescent and teenage singers.
Lots of work on thick/thin folds, getting away from ‘stiff folds’ (which I’m not a fan of in terms of defining breathiness, there are several ways of being breathy!) and onto a fuller resonant sound should do her good. The adduction exercises that the ENT suggests are likely to be very simple and not quite suitable for the physical demands of singing – I’d give her your own that include range and connection with the breath.
Hope this helps!
-
Ben, that is available but I’m not a big fan of hyphons in domains! Funny – I’ve never really been a Matthew…
-
Hmmm… mattpocock.com is not available – that’s my ideal choice. I prefer matt over matthew, but I prefer .com over .co.uk…
-
As in – the domain names, not the websites: both are currently empty:)
-
Great idea, Chris. If you and the student feel it works, it works:)
-
Chris, I never have. Although I do sometimes give grace to people – I find you get better retention in the long run that way. Also, Ruth’s welcome letter idea is really smart. I totally should have done that.
-
I’d send out a group email to all of your students, mentioning in broad terms that you’d just like to make them aware of a new cancellation policy that you’re putting in place. Say broad things like: “Bit of a change of pace here at Singing Lessons Exeter. I didn’t want to catch anyone out so I thought I’d let you all know: it’s industry practice to have a same-day cancellation policy. So if you pop me an email the night before, that’s fine and dandy. But if you cancel the same day as the lesson, the fee will still be due. Unless I manage to sneak someone in to fill your place, of course.”
(Please do steal that word-for-word :D)
-
Sure thing, pop me a message and we’ll sort out a time this week. I’m essay-writing at the mo so desperate for any distractions:)
-
Oooh, you should check to see if her larynx is off-centre too! There are some great tongue strengthening exercises that I got taught by a speech language therapist – happy to show you over Skype if you like!
-
What kind of twist are we talking? Is it the tip that’s twisting?
-
Is that keeping it flat as he goes into higher notes?
-
Could it be that he’s using a breathy sound? Using a breathier tone uses up more air faster so perhaps getting him to focus on twang/hard palate resonance/forward placement would work wonders?
-
Haha – heard about this from a friend: did it talk about how they first came up with it?
-
True dat – I pay £8/hour, though Guildford is pretty scarce for finding studio space! 5-8 an hour sounds pretty reasonable:)
-
Eep – really tough question! I’d say focus on technical stuff and try to pair the top students with the lowest students on technique exercises. That way the ones who get it quickly can be put in the teaching role with the less experienced ones: that firms up the top singers’ knowledge while making sure the other ones get the attention they need. Tough question though!
-
Boom! Contact Chris Grayston if you want some judging work there too:)
-
Ok cool – I have an exercise called ‘chord farming’, where you teach them the harmonic rules of a minor chord, major chord etc, then give them the first note and say ‘hum all the notes of a minor chord’. Gets them thinking about the relative notes of that scale. I usually use it on older kids but you can make it more game-like for her:) Was that the kind of thing you were thinking about?
-
Perfect pitch as in she can pick notes out of the air? Wow, that’s crazy! Sounds like an ideal student, what kind of exercises do you need?
-
Something like this for teachers: https://completevocal.institute/product/complete-vocal-technique/
-
Ooh – to widen out the market a bit, could we make a cheaper version for students too, with the fundamental techniques in there for them?
-
Yeah, I really like that idea – if we pulled together on the writing we could get something really good really quickly:)
-
How would we put it together? Would it be better to make it a book that we sell copies of, or like an online resource that people can purchase an online PDF from?
-
Awesome! This group really is excellent;)
-
Awesome – I think that’d be a great thing to get into writing for any new teachers coming aboardWhat does everyone think?
-
Yeah…. What he said! I should probably say that the only reason I’m currently ahead of him is that he helped me out so much
-
Matthew Rusk – your time to shine.
-
(Inside joke alert) – Also my Klout is soooo much better, Matthew Rusk
-
Haha, I’m beating him in Exeter
-
Also, a couple of well-placed posters in University music/drama buildings worked well for me. But SEO’s the motherlode.
-
Gumtree, musicteachers.co.uk – but SEO is king! See if you can make your own website
-
Maybe say that there’s more preparation involved in the double lesson?
-
Hi Eliza – I’d say bite the bullet! Try and see if you put it to something else. When I raised prices I was able to say that my rent on the building was going up (because it was, although not as much as I raised the prices to!). But you might be able to say that it’s down to some other expense. Hope it goes well!
-
Good plan! I am a member but I haven’t ever really looked into the benefits of it – are there any courses coming up that we could go to?
-
Also means I can put links to articles that I’ve written on the various concepts we’ve been talking about, so they can access the information at home
-
I keep my lesson notes in Evernote, which means I’m able to share a permanent link with my students which updates every time we have a lesson. All free too! Here’s an example:
-
Oh wow, that’s an awesome idea about the midi piano tracks – hadn’t thought about that at all but a great idea! I had been thinking of recommending apps for my singers to use but hadn’t found the time – I’ll check that one out
-
Sure, that sounds a little like constriction to me – I’d say get yourself to an Estill course so that you can work out what to change in yourself! Often it’s easier to see it in other people than in your own voice!
-
I use BookFresh, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Not enough options and a bit lame overall. I basically went for it because the woman endorsing it had an amazing name: Jenny Clevidence. http://www.bookfresh.com
-
No worries – even to the best/baldest of us!
-
Absolutely and completely normal! I was worried about that too when I started out – but some students can only commit for one or two lessons for financial or personal reasons. It’s the terrain! But if most of your students are staying with you for more you’re definitely doing something right!
-
Mmm – same as one of the people on my course. And that’s true what Kat says about it being in your sleep, I get that a lot.
-
I think they’re just guarding against acid reflux – have you felt like you’ve had heartburn recently?
-
I’d even go further and say as much as a gallon (4.5 litres) a day for heavy voice users like us folks!
-
Although defo worth seeking the ENT’s help as well – never trust the word of a bald man. We’ve got nothing to lose.
-
That’s true – but a small change in habits can make a big difference. Maybe try cutting the e-cigs to weekends-only and keeping a 2L bottle by your side for a couple of weeks?
-
Yeah – the water’s probably the thing then. Tea’s not amazing for hydration since the caffeine dries you out and the hot tea slows down your intake of fluids.
